Weatherwise
by betawho
Summary: The Doctor and River are trapped in an isolated cabin in the woods as the weather gets worse around them. You can never trust the weather. (This story is a bit saucier than my usual fare.) Written for the "Bad Weather" prompt on Livejournal.


Thunder crashed and roared, rain lashed the windowpanes, wind howled through the cracks in the log cabin and hailstones pattered on the tin roof.

The temperature had plummeted, and the cold, clammy feeling of the room had the Doctor and River huddled under a fur blanket beside the hearth, slowly feeding the remains of an antique chair into the fire.

"It doesn't make sense," the Doctor protested, wiping the rainwater off his face. "There were no signs that the weather would turn like this." He stared down at River, she was looking pale with cold, her normally frizzy hair hanging in lank corkscrews around a face dominated by a cold red nose. He reached up and buffed her nose with the flat of one hand, as if he could rub warmth into it.

"Sweetie, please!" River pulled down his hand and pulled it into her lap under the covers, wrapping both her cold hands around his warm one. "The fire will warm us up soon enough," she said, rubbing her own nose with one hand. "Then we can make a break back for the Tardis."

A particularly large hailstone slammed off the roof, making them both jump. They looked up. The tin roof jumped and shuddered under the staccato pounding of thousands of hailstones, dents formed here and there to punctuate the barrage.

The temperature dropped even further. The Doctor looked down and his eyes widened as he saw River's breath mist in front of her mouth. "River!" She was starting to shiver.

He whipped the edge of the fur rug over their heads, and started shoving at River's soaked clothing. "We've got to get you out of these before you catch your death!"

River chuckled weakly. "Normally, Sweetie, I'd be all for it. But I don't fancy making a break for the Tardis in the nude."

The Doctor peeked out of a slit in their enveloping blanket. Wind gusted past the frosted, single pane window, snowflakes swirled past in increasingly heavy numbers, sticking to the glass.

He gritted his teeth. "It doesn't look like that's going to be an option now."

River trembled from the cold, shivering, he stared down at her in horror when he heard her teeth chattering. He popped his head up over the fur blanket and swiveled it, looking for anything in the abandoned cabin that they could use for warmth.

The floor was dirt, the walls were timber, inexpertly patched with flaking bits of clay that let in gusts of freezing wind. They had already used the rotted rope and frame of the bed to start the fire, and the one lone wood chair was swiftly following.

The roof was sound, but other than a huge stone hearth there was nothing else.

River all but crawled into his lap, shivering. He pulled the flap closed again and tucked her in close to him, sharing his body heat.

"Sweetie," she said, her voice muffled by her cold nose wedged into his bow tie. "Could you do that ramping up thing you do?"

He stared down at her, it wasn't like River to sound so abject. He knew he didn't feel the cold as much as she did. She still wasn't quite as Time Lord as he was and didn't have the tolerance for extremes. He ramped up his body temperature, using his voluntary control of his biological systems.

He felt his skin flush and heat. Heard River make a whimpering noise of both distress and relief as she curled closer to him.

He pushed her back slightly and quickly and efficiently stripped her out of her wet clothes. This was no time for modesty. He didn't want her catching hypothermia. The wind gusted, shaking the roof, and another hailstone fell like a hammerblow, punctuating his decision.

He tossed their clothes toward the hearthstones, they'd dry by morning, wrinkled but dry. And if not, he could always sonic them.

River's skin was still cold and clammy from the rainwater. He took her feet into his hands and rubbed them, they were like ice. He set his sonic screwdriver to its lowest level and ran it over her toes. He had a fondness for her toes, he didn't want her losing any of them to frostbite.

River giggled. "It's not funny, River!" he protested, sweeping the sonic back and forth, rubbing at her toes as he brought the warmth back to them.

"I can't help it," she protested, her hair brushing his bare shoulder as he bent over her legs. "It tickles."

He breathed out a sigh of relief. At least the nerve endings weren't damaged.

He felt her tuck her face into his neck, not the first time she'd done that when they'd been stranded somewhere freezing. His skin stung with heat, prickling like ants were crawling over it, but he kept his metabolism ramped up. If it kept her warm, it was worth it.

The wind howled, the sound becoming muffled as the cabin became encased in snow, the freezing breeze through the cracks dropped off as they were sealed with snow. The fire crackled. His sonic hummed.

River's hair had dried, curling like a cushion under the weight of the fur over their heads. She was warming up nicely in his lap. She shifted, and pulled her toes away from the sonic screwdriver.

He felt her lips against his neck...

—

The world glowed a bright glittery white. Icicles sparkled from tree limbs. Rabbit tracks marred the otherwise pristine layer of snow. And River stepped out of the log cabin, her clothes wrinkled, her hair mussed, and a gave a luxurious stretch, a huge grin on her face.

The Doctor walked up behind her, shrugging into his suspenders. "Nice," he said, when he saw the winter wonderland spread before them. Light twinkled off the snow in a scintillating rainbow of colors. "Pretty," he said.

He turned and looked down at his wife beside him, she was flushed, sparkly eyed, and grinning at him, biting the edge of her lip as she looked at him. "Pretty," he repeated, his eyes dark. He kissed the tip of her nose.

"Come on, the Tardis is this way." He stepped off the porch into the pristine snow and strode away, a jaunty swing in his stride.

"You go ahead, Sweetie, Just something I have to do first."

He looked at her, nodded as she pointed behind the cabin, and strode off.

River sauntered behind the dilapidated but snug little building. She leaned back to check around the corner that he wasn't watching, then grinned and patted the large grey industrial cube that sat behind the cabin.

She brushed away the snow and programmed in a command on a keypad. The machine shivered, then dematerialized with a silent, Tardis-like fade out.

As the snow fell away, it revealed the logo:

"The Weathermaker 3000."

—

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